So he's Irish, but he was in Canada once, I guess? Or he's drinking Canadian whiskey? I like the quip, but the fact of his not being Canadian is slightly confusing to me. I don't know BEHAN at all—doubt it would've helped much with this difficult puzzle. Quote puzzles are notoriously time-consuming (compared to other themed puzzles) because there is no pattern to pick up and no way to know where the quip is going (unless you've heard it before or it's moving in some very predictable direction I guess). I am not familiar with the use of "NOTICE" in this quip, though I'm guessing it simply means advertisement. Once I got the quip as far as CANADA DRY, I knew vaguely what the joke would be. I like the punchline's terseness. As for the rest of the grid—it is eye-popping. Very tough, but very light on junk. Enjoyable, but much more a Thursday than a Wednesday puzzle. Combine BEQ's sensibility (which involves tricky, often very contemporary cluing) with a quip puzzle, and you have a recipe for toughness. My near downfall was the FSIX / SIM CARD crossing. I never use F keys so that clue meant nothing to me. And I can't remember the last time I saw or used the phrase SIM CARD (26D: Data holder on a cellphone). Scary, but that "S" was (in the end) inferrable via F-SIX (25A: Key in the middle of the top row), though I'm sure there are people out there right now wondering what an AIM CARD and a FAIX key are. Or a LIM CARD and a FLIX key. Etc.

I'd completely forgotten the name DUARTE (1980s Salvadoran president). Was totally flummoxed by ONE DOWN (1D: You are here). Had BEYONCÉ for BELUSHI (2D: Only person to have the #1 movie, #1 album and #1-rated late-night TV show all in the same week) (really should've read the clue all the way to the end...). Clue on CIG was rough (22A: Parliament, e.g., in brief). Wanted ZIT to be NIT at first (51D: Small blemish, in slang). Briefly wondered why Eisenhower would've been the [Subj. of the 1948 Nobel in Physiology or Medicine]. "Ohhhhhh ... DDT! Yeah, that makes more sense." JEEZ and ANAL seem borderline profane, so I like that they are symmetrical.

Bullets:

14A: Org. whose logo features the letter pi with an arrow through it (NEA) — I think this is my wife's union. I've never seen their logo.

24A: Courtier who invites Hamlet to duel with Laertes (OSRIC) — minor character, but I used him in a puzzle once, so he's an easy pick-up. The word "courtier" (as well as the 5-letter length) is a give-away.

4D: Feature of Dr. Frankenstein's lab (SWITCH) — a great but (again) very tough clue for SWITCH.

37D: ___ Kitchen (organic frozen food company) (AMY'S) — wow, do people know this company? I do, but only because I shop in the little "healthy" ghetto in Wegman's (where all the whole grains and loose leaf teas and soy milk and gluten-free junk is). I enjoy some of AMY'S veggie burgers. The pot pies, not so much. Too much crust.

48D: Thing watched while driving through a speed trap (NEEDLE) — it's hard to shoot heroin and drive at the same time.

yeah, I agree with Rex. Tough but some of the fill is wonderful. Scrabbly, beautifully clued. Don't necessarily love the quote-- may be because I had so much trouble parsing it, even after I was done. I kept reading DRY AND DIVE instead of DRY AND I'VE. But even after I got it, I did not find the saying particularly clever..

On the other hand, look at the BANJOS and JETHROs and XEROXES and SNEEZY... Good stuff!

I knew SIM CARDs from all the traveling. The secret is to get a phone with an open configuration and buy a local SIM card if you can possibly manage it. Saves a ton of money.

LOVED this - would have been much harder to do ON ACID. Parliament was my brand when I partook, and was also the CIG of choice of a major character in The Art of Fielding, which I finished yesterday, so that fell nicely. As the only vegan in my household, Amy's frozen foods are a staple (great quality, but small portions).

I'm assuming SNL, plus the Blues Brothers movie and album were the three number 1s in 2D.

Had GEEZ - seems better than with a J. I've always assumed that it was short for GEE WHIZ, not for Jesus. Oh well - when Mr. HP wouldn't appear, that was the only letter in question!

I got the SIMCARD but I'll be damned if FSIX reared its head. FSUX sounded more Quigley(esque) and ONACUD sounds like you might be tripping. By the way, what IS ONACID?.Also not a great fan of quips but I just danced along in my fog induced hacking cough and decided this was a damn good puzzle.Loved GEEZ, BOSSY and GOAD in that little right hand corner.My kids say I'm ANAL about everything...Not sure why.

As a pediatrician, I object to an OBs being called baby docs.The woman in labor is the patient of the OB; the baby is the patient of the pediatrician. I spent many nights of my residency running tithe delivery room, to be handed a newborn to resuscitate, while the OB delivered the placenta and attended to the mother.

Hand up for the Geez/Jeez error initially. Can't believe "anal" made it into the puzz, but why not? @Gill, not to worry, people say it about me, too. Suspect that a lot of us who hang around here in Rexville are candidates.

@Gill I.P., just in case you weren't joking, it parses as ON ACID. I found it kind of interesting to learn that Steve Jobs considered taking LSD to have been "a profound experience, one of the most important things in my life." I tried it a few times in my youth and just saw lots of pretty colors. Maybe I was doing it wrong.

Flamed out at ABC/ABYS.The NW corner was the last in- ONE DOWN was a hoot.A lot to like and I won't hold a grudge I've never seen Breaking Bad but I should have known it wasn't ABC.I wanted SWIVEL at first and then thought maybe SWINGS? but SWITCH I finally remembered from Young Frankenstein.Two pipe joints-JEEZ louise!

Dislike quip puzzles, never heard of Brendan Behan. Did the same thing as @foodie with DRY AND DIVE, had gEEZ before I looked up the Bruce Springsteen album (sacrilege on a Wednesday) and changed my geez to JEEZ. Not a good experience tonight, looking forward to Thursday.

I was so convinced 2D had to be Henry MANCINI -- a man whose talents also spanned various media -- it took me a while to clean up the NW corner, especially with SWIVEL as my first choice for 4D. Once fixed, the rest was a breeze... but can someone clarify the quip? The pun on "dry" isn't quite tracking, familiar though I am with both the soft drink and alcohol-free connotation.

Hand up for disliking OBS (1A),not only for reasons given by others but also because an abbreviation wasn't indicated.

Medium here, except for FSIX. Like Rex, I never use the F keys and I wasn't expecting it. My downfall was in having NIL for 12D (NIX) so I was looking to fill F_IL. Had to check squares in AL and them it was clear.

SW was slowed a bit because of LEERS @ 61A to start.

Debated whether "Breaking Bad" might be on ABC and the organic frozen food place be ABY'S. Decided not and was rewarded for that decision. Apparently this AMY'S is no relation to Amy's Ice Cream, which is primarily an Austin TX chain and well worth a visit if you're there.

20A was (Daniel) ORTEGA for a while. Wrong Central American country. Also, he is President again (who knew?) so "former" would have been misleading.

'Sim card' is quite a common phrase in Asia, although the iPhone 4 and 4s are using a 'micro sim card'. I got 'sim card' right away but struggled to come up with 'F six. Once I remembered that Peter Falk was Columbo, the super obvious combination of 'f' and 's' gave it away.

Pretty crunchy for a Wednesday. NW stayed blank for an alarmingly long time. But loved the accumulating "Doh!" moments -- ONE DOWN. F SIX. I use the F keys all the time (I'm a programmer) but was doing the puzzle on my iPhone and could not visualize a "top row" on a standard keyboard any higher than the numbers! Even after I had the initial FS I was like, WTF? Started to wonder if it was Peter Salk. No, that's the polio guy.

But this is the kind of puzzle I like... doesn't give itself up TOO easily. Something about how the quip was parsed between the theme answers made it really tough to make sense of until the very end. And that's how it should be!

Inspite of quip-heavy from obscure author, this puz was fun. Overall boozy theme. At one time I had the entire North filled with zero entries in the South! The quip appeared quite easily. 26a and 51a were original, as was 1d.

I ended up with FlIX/lIMCARD. I didn't even think of the top row on a computer as I was focusing on the "key" to the answer at 25A being in the top row of this puzzle! (Took my lead there from 1D's "You are here" clue.) So I convinced myself that SLOMO would be seen in FLIX. Ugh.

I did love all the scrabbly letters and tough cluing, but dare I cry Natick at that sticky crossing?

Hate to spend (now) $2.50 on the Times to do a Wednesday puzzle---normally I'll only spring for the Thursday-Friday-Saturday triad---but after a glance at this BEQ triumph I gave my SBUX barista the dough.

ACME: I'll reluctantly give BEQ a pass on his narcissistic shout-out since it was in the clue rather than the answer. A close call, though....

I was kind of surprised that this isn't the first time 'anal' has made it, but only a few others. Once it was an abbreviation for "psychological work", so that doesn't really count (although a nice way to sneak it in). Not at all surprised that BEQ had used it before in a diagramless puzzle in 2010: "Incredibly persnickety".

Funny episode of "The League" on FX had the boys struggling with their spell-checkers. Pete's girlfriend joined them at the bar and wryly pointed out that Pete's texting suggestion of 'alan sex' sounded interesting.

A terrific, perfect Wednesday, even though I never heard of Behan. The quip was funny stuff. I had a bit of a time seeing "IVE" = I'VE. Hardest part by far was FSIX (which I thought was fabulous) cross, but I knew Peter Falk right off and SIMCARD was pretty easy, IMHO. SE and NW were fabulous, with XEROXED and ONEDOWN; fill to make these work was okay, given these brilliant ones. With BELUSHI, FALK, DUARTE, played a bit to the older crowd, which works for me, but I can see this playing more Thursday for the South of 50 cohort.

I always enjoy cracking a BEQ puzzle and this one did not disappoint. Hard clues for easy answers a challenge for early morning before the cobwebs disappear.

I have actually heard this quip before someplace. And I go on record to say that Vernor's ginger ale is far superior to Canada Dry. It might be a brand confined to the Midwest, but if you see it and like ginger ale, give it a try. Very gingery.

Wow, a BEQ Wednesday that I finished in one sitting... either I'm getting better at these, or BEQ is getting old like the rest of us fogeys.

Never heard of Mr. BEHAN, but the quote was a worthy one. Lots of great fill all over the grid with tough-but-gettable cluing. Struggled with FSIX (initially wanted FMAJ or FMIN, but neither worked with the crosses) and ONEDOWN (like someone else, considered ONEARTH for far too long), but otherwise chugged through this one pretty cleanly. Only writeover: had MOO before MEW.

Quote puzzles are usually about as much fun as a root canal gone wrong but, BEQ's non-theme cluing is delightfully gnarly and the over-all puzzle is as fresh as a newly unwrapped bar of Irish Spring. (Or, maybe, using a more appropriate Behan metaphor, as smooth as 24 year-old Irish whiskey).

With the keyboard's obscure FZIX, JEEZ rather than the expected GEEZ, and AMYS crossing AMC, BEQ seemed to be giving many solvers an unwelcome chance for multiple Naticks but, as a slight reward, Shakespeare's courtier du jour, OSRIC has evolved into a friendly gimme over time.

And, finally, who else but BEQ would make the effort to include a mini-theme featuring "Pipe joint"(s) he has known, by presenting the letter shaped bends of ELL and TEE.

Played like a Thursday for me, with the NW being Friday tough. I have to agree with @Julie and @Deb about OBS. I never wrote in "ped" but it was my hypothesis up until the very end. Having OrRIC also blinded me to BELUSHI, I was picking my brain to come up with a Carson competitor who might have made number 1; Bishop, Griffin, seems like there was a new one every couple of years in the sixties and seventies. I also thought it should be "that" not WHICH. So that whole corner took a long time to sort out.

Where I grew up there were still a number of older Hollanders who were more offended by JEEZ, gee whiz, or god's blood, than by ANAL or other scatological phrases. Taking the Lord's name in vain is enjoined in the Bible, after all.

BEHAN was a gimme for me because he's the Irish playwright I don't know.

I don't like artists who profit from the fact that they're raging alcoholics/addicts by making jokes about their addictions while it's still funny/evocative but don't hang around to rue their addiction after they're dead. Seems like a cop-out to me.

@Quilter and @John V - Vernors is so different from other ginger ales as to be a whole different kind of soda pop. And I always warn people first trying Vernors about the SNEEZY result of opening the can too close to your nose.

Also do not like quip puzzles but love BEQ challenges. Got BEHAN right off. Perhaps an age or I'm Irish American thing. DNF. Missed 2 and 3D and too eager to come here so quit, though I had DUARTE and erased him. Mind stuck with talk shows, not SNL. Went all the way back to Steve Allen trying to think of answer.

Really had a good time with this. O-S threw me off; liked slant on OGLES; lots of Js, Zs, Xs, crunchy as noted above. BEQ self ref okay by me; my name in there too, tee hee. Thanks Mr. Quigley.

Usually I don't like quote puzzles but this one was a lot of fun-- clever cluing and smooth fill. Got the quote pretty quickly which helped a lot, but I don't know Brendan Behan so I didn't connect that answer to the quote until I came here.

One small quibble-- the ukulele is related to the banjo in that they are both stringed instruments, but they have very different ancestry, the banjo descending from African gourd instruments, and the uke descending from Portuguese stringed instruments brought to Hawaii in the 1800s. Probably a little beyond most people's knowledge of music instrument history, though

Finished with one blank square at ONA_ID and _IG. Kept thinking "On a ??-- WTF?" and was stuck on forms of government for "Parliament, e.g." so I had to come here for the answer. Still loved the puzzle, though.Absolutely agree about Vernor's. Best!

I usually cannot get on BEQ's vibe but today I did. Loved this grid full of my favorite sins.LSD was my drug of choice back when I knew where to get it and the quality was top notch. My reaction was very much like Steve Jobs'.We had a discussion about Behan last time he was in a puzzle. From that I bought Borstal Boy. Borstal is Brit-speak for any detention center for young men/boys.Lots to love in the grid and the clues. Thanks Brendan.

Rex, I was eyeballing AMY'S pot pies yesterday afternoon! "Too much crust" is a compelling argument in favor of the pies, if you ask me—but alas, the inclusion of tofu in the veggie pot pie makes it a nonstarter for me.

My Christmas present to myself was getting the twice-weekly BEQ puzzle subscription. He's a bit of a bête noir for me, as we don't seem to share a wavelength. So when I saw his byline, I groaned.

I SAW A NOTICE and it SAID... so the NW stayed doubly obscure for me. I was employed and not SALARIED, I rejected OBS and tried to think of baby documents that might be abbreviated into two letters. Never knew the rapper, didn't recognize the logo, and reading Hamlet 12 times in my youth and even seeing it recently didn't help me with OSRIC. The only president I could come up with was Allende, who didn't fit and wasn't Salvadoran. WHEW!

Finally I looked up the phrase and everything began to fall into place. Very nice puzzle, even if I can finish a BEQ only rarely.

@EG in TO - You're quite right about the Uke...I am not a musical instrument historian, but I am Portuguese! Speaking of which, the January bonus puzzle celebrating the Euro turning 10 may interest you...

Some years ago there was a Kenneth Branaugh production of Hamlet on PBS. Robin Williams played OSRIC and even though it is a tiny part I remember it well. He played it totally straight, yet deserving of the ridicule of Hamlet and friends.

Two Ponies is right--Behan has tripped up people before when he was clued as author of Borstal Boy (or vice versa.)

I didn't know he was the source of that joke. I thought it was just an old cornpone joke--sounded like something from the WSM radio days. It's been the source of at least a couple of country songs.

I got a lot of the things that tripped people up today--ONE DOWN and CIG were first pass answers I got--but got tripped up by(and failed the puzzle because of) the "London jazz duo" clue crossing "small blemish." I went with NIT/NEDS. NEDS makes no sense, NIT only slightly more sense, but I got lazy going through the alphabet, I guess.

Personal problem: Confusing PAD and PAt for a tourney-disqualifyingly long amount of time. Made the quip look like it had "no dice" in it, which was making a pleasant BEQ crossword seem like War Puz. (Just saw "War Horse" yesterday, so everything is War ___, today. Especially War Budgie.)

I had the right idea for 1D: Had "onthewn" (on the west north) - Was thrown by the "w" being where it was. Just gave in and thought it was part of the joke - because northwest can just as truly be west north, even though we don't say it that way. Eventually, the crosses corrected it.

Other problem was that PARLIAMENT for me was "leg." It didn't help that it and "cig" both ended in "g."

I've been enjoying other BEW puzzles of late, all of which are very thorny and extremely satisfying to finish, so I was pleased but not too surprised to nail this one in a little under 10 minutes (a minor miracle for me in a quip puzzle, which usually slows me up big big time).

I loved this one - even though I've never heard of Brendan BEHAN, the crosses were very simple, and the quip was fun. Aside from that, it was a matter of filling in the easy entries, which seamlessly led to the medium and difficult ones, as the fill and cluing were terrific.

NW was also tough for me - for the #1 answer at 2D I was thinking too contemporary and also only considering late-night TALK shows, and 1D was just awesome and nasty. And I have just GOT to commit OSRIC to my brain - one of many frequent crossword answers that I never remember from one puzzle to the next.

i "cheated" and peeked at my key board for fsix. it reminded me that when i gave the IQ test to kids for 20 years as a school psychologist not one child thought to look at the telephone on my desk when given a picture of a phone and asked to find what was missing in the pic. i knew behan but not amys. hand up for Geez. but otherwise didn't find the puzzle challenging for wed.

I would normally rather shove upholstery tacks into my gums than work a quip/quote puzzle, but I found today's delightful, zippy, and relatively easy. Having just yesterday upgraded my son's phone, I got SIMCARD immediately. Was held up in the E with PUSHY until the "s" in IRISES showed me BOSSY. I always appreciate Js and Zs! Speaking of The Beverly Hillbillies, has any constructor ever played around with the unexpected pronunciations of words like "victuals, chitterlings, breeches. . ..?" I'm a lot newer to Crossword Land than most of ya'll. Thanks, BEQ, for a terrific PREDAWN (what I kept wanting at 1D, since I solved it at 5:30 this morning)!

@rex -- loved the needle quip, and I have heard of Amy's (good products too!).

@aaron -- very funny!

It doesn't happen often, but this puzzle was right on my wavelength. I threw down the whole quote with many letters missing, got 1D right away with a big smile, spelled JEEZ right, and so on. A joyful solve.

There is a pub in Midtown Manhattan I frequent called PJ Morans. In it hangs a painting of Brendan Behan. I have always commented it looks just like John Belushi. Not sure if BEQ is aware of this coincidence

@JaxInL.A.Thanks for posting the link. I am in L.A. for a couple of weeks helping my wife with a show. I realize that this is probably like saying that I am in New England, but if we are near one another maybe we could have coffee.

@archaeoprofYou posted a couple of days ago that you were giving a course on the NYT puzzle. I am sure it was a joke but if not I would like to see the syllabus.

I once gave a lab in a computer security course I taught where the students had to crack the key that was used to scramble a NYT puzzle.

@JaxinLA, you didn't try hard enough to fit Alende into 20A... a little misspelling can do wonders for fitting wrong answers. Besides, when his first name is Salvador and you've finished off 3 bottles of wine with your company last night, anything goes.

@TwoPonies, thanks for bringing up the Borstal Boys from a puzzle past. I knew I'd heard of Brendan Behan before, but couldn't remember from where.

Why did I not finish last night? Had (got) SlEEpY, wasn't sure of IRISES, and couldn't remember Cheech's first name, gEEZ. (Missed that and AMY/AbYs too.) An embarrasing Wednesday DNF. Hand up for not liking quip puzzles. I also notice that no-one here has said that they like the damn things.

What a difference a year makes. Used to find BEQ's puzzles too hip and esoteric, but after solving his two-a-week puzzles for the past twelve months, this one went down easy. Had the AbC/AbYS problem, but now kick myself for that mistake.Am not a fan of rap music and the meaningless names that BEQ uses, but even some of them are starting to get inferrable. Overall, another masterpiece from Brendan. It must be hard for Shortz not to run every puzzle he submits.

ksquare...back in teh mesezoic era of computing, before windows and guis and mice, computer makers offered up a new, dedicated row of keys to help perform commonly used tasks.Now they do things like hibernate computers, switch to external displays, or offer themselves up to be re-assigned to any frivolous whim of the user.

I prefer keyboard over mouse for just about everything, myself.

@Jax - thx for the interesting read.

@archeo & @r.alph - wish I had y'all for profs during my college days!

This week's relative difficulty ratings. See my 8/1/2009 post for an explanation. In a nutshell, the higher the ratio, the higher this week's median solve time is relative to the average for the corresponding day of the week.

All solvers (this week's median solve time, average for day of week, ratio, percentile, rating)

Back when computers could only run one app at a time, and the only way to interact with them was keyboard (not a mouse), each function key had a task assigned to it...

FOr us "ordinary" folks - plain old users of computers, they serve little purpose.On a desktop computer, about the only thing you might ever use is the Prnt Scrn key, which copies a screen shot into your clipboard.On a laptop, more of them are used, for things like putting the laptop into sleep mode or switching the display to a projector.

If this be error, and upon me proved, I never writ, - oops, I digress...

If this doesn't help, I would take that as a sign that you don't need to know, and certainly don't need to care!

For those interested, the long partial could have been avoided by changing 32-Across OOF to EFF. This move allows 6-Down to become TRADE OFF/WRITE OFF or many ????E?OFF combos. There's at least on good solution for the upper left corner using TRADEOFF.

Funny that someone didn't realize that ON ACID equates to tripping. While looking at all the pretty colors (someone else's reference), you might just miss the curb and fall on your face. Personally, when my college roommate and I did acid the first time, we stayed up playing Asteroids (great tracers) before going out to watch the sunrise (pretty spectacular colors).

No gram = invisible monogram? No. It means you're completely out of weed. Especially here in Oregon where less than an ounce (28 grams!) gets you the equivalent of a parking ticket.

Thanks to Two Ponies for the Borstal reference. One of the all-time great punk songs is "Borstal Breakout" by Sham 69. I'd always assumed that Borstal was an English slum. Who knew?

Hey,John V. Another Buffalo boy here. I can remember when the Vernor store was on Main Street next to Shea's Buffalo. First time commenting although been reading the blogs for some time. Although I got FSIX fairly fast, I, for whatever reason, was thinking of the musical Key of F, and therefore didn't understand the answer right away. First had GEEZ/GOAD, and since I'm too old to know any Springsteen tunes, I realized it was "J" not "G", because I knew the character Tom Joad from the novel "Grapes of Wrath". Rest of it came fairly fast, but some challenges.

I second all the love that has been heaped on this puzzle. Any grid that has "DRINKCANADA" right smack in the middle gets two thumbs up from me(although I'm more apt to drink Kentucky). It even has ZEDS for solvers north of the border - fabulous!

Does anybody but me have to put their captcha in twice before blogger will publish a comment?

@archaeprof: That's like saying "As an oboe player, I don't regard the tuba and the cornet as relatives."

@dirigonzo: Right on! Canada Dry!Two zeds! Stanley Cup next.

Passing thought: If people didn't know in advance that this was a BEQ puzzle, would the love have flowed as gushingly? Anyway, a fun puzzle, but perhaps because I'm from Canada, I thought that Aby's was a fine food company, alas.

Arrgh! (Still a pirate today) Could not for the life of me figure out the FSIX. Couldn't stop thinking of the piano keyboard. And I use a computer all day long while I solve. Loved 2D but started with Jay Leno as the only talk show host with seven letters.

Because I can't spell very well could only thing of granny as the Beverly Hillbillies rep. Thought JETHRO was jethrow...Oh well, great puzzle.

Hard to believe that joke actually had to be EXPLAINED to someone. It's at least fifty years old. And before we get too holier-than-thou with drinking artists, let's remember that without alcohol, we might never have known Behan, or Poe, etc. etc. I found this puzzle easy-medium; would have been a straight easy but for a couple of trouble spots. The first fill I knew 100% was the wonderful Peter FALK as Lt. "One-more-thing" Columbo. That gave me the F of 25a--which I rushed to assume was FIVE. Later, even when I wanted NIX I rejected it until very late, after almost everything was in. My other trouble was trying to guess 2d; that's the kind of trivia you think you just HAVE to know without looking up. So instead of working crosses--which is what I wound up doing anyway--I took a shot with BOBHOPE. The B was in, for sure (OBS). As has already been said, the fill is great. I like to combine neighboring entries, as: there's ONE BELUSHI DOWN and one still SALARIED. IRISES in NICHES make me SNEEZY, BANJOS give me ENOUGH HASSLE, and don't you hate it when people OVERUSE XEROXES? The one that doesn't belong in there is ALIGHTED. Wouldn't the past tense of ALIGHT be ALIT? JEEZ. All that plus a pangram. It's not Q-less: we have not only the constructor, but the quip. Toughest clue: "Parliament, e.g." for CIG. A long, unabbreviated name for an abbreviation. Hmmm. Thanks to both Brendans.